Who are you, Lord?

When Paul was contronted on the road to Damuscus, he said, “Who are you, Lord?”

It’s interesting.  Clearly there was something extraordinary about the encounter.  It’s unclear if Paul was blind at this point of a moment later.  But he must have realized something was going down, he must have realized he was in the presence of greatness, otherwise, he would not have ended the question with the word, “Lord.”

And yet, he’d spent his whole life seeking out God.  He had the scriptures memorized.  He lived by exhausting, exacting laws.  He was filled with fire and felt like he was doing God’s will as he persecuted the early Christians.

I wonder what it was like.  He’s no dummy.  He must have– just at that moment– realized that his entire life had been basically a farce.  He must have realized– just at that moment– that he was face-to-face with the object he’d been seeking for his whole life.  The fact that he asks who it is though indicates that he realized he’d been barking up the wrong tree, that he never really got it at all.

Reaping

There is this field in  my mind and in it I am reaping what I have sewn.

Every day all day I am reaping what I sewn.

And it is always day.

There is one row of the field and it is endless, almost endless in front of me and behind me.  This one row is my row.

There are other rows endlessly to my left and to my right.  Others reap what they sew in these rows.

Strange plants, knee high and desperate for water are in front of me.  They have these fruits.  Strange fruits, wrinkled and coarse.  So feeble are the stalks that one of these little fruits weighs the whole thing down. 

I pluck the fruit from the plant and I place it in a sack tied to my belt at my left hip.  The sack doesn’t ever seem to get bigger when I drop them in, though I do this nearly endlessly.

It doesn’t ever seem to get smaller when I reach in and pluck one out to eat it.  It does not taste like anything and I do not eat because I am hungry.  I eat it in the place where I am endlessly reaping what I have sewn because that is what I must do.

I move slowly and I trample the naked stalk under my booted feet.  I am holding this wooden thing which is tied to something heavy behind me.  It was a thing designed for a beast and not for a man.  A large wooden piece, with two rusting chains trailing back behind me.

The chains are linked to something enormous behind me.  I pull it slowly.  It crushes the naked stalks beneath its wieght. 

The thing that I am dragging digs a rut in the ground.  When I reach the nearly endless end of the row of the field where I reap and sew, I will turn around.

My yolk and the thing which the yolk drags will disappear.  There will be another sack then, at my right hip.   I will walk only slightly faster than before.  I will bend down and place the seeds in the little rut I dug. 

There are things that do not make sense.  One of them is that on the trip down I have enough arms to hold the yolk and pluck the fruit and drop the fruit into the sack.

Something else that does make sense is that by the time I reach the very end of my row in the field the fruits have grown back up again.  I had reaped.  I shall sew.  And the yolk is back.

I do not know why I do not look back behind me.

I know that it is some great boulder that I pull.

It is both a rock and a metaphor and my hands grow blisters that are both metaphoric and true.

That rock is the weight of my selfishness.  It is the weight of my pride.  It is the weight of my hurt.  It is the weight of my self sufficieincy, and my delusions.

It is as large as a house and my hands bleed where I push at the yolk.

And I remember that there was a man who said that his yolk was light and easy.

And yet he said I should take up a cross for him.  He said I should lose my life for him.  He said these things that I did not understand.  He was the one who told me I will reap what I sew.

And I do reap what I sew.  But I do not believe those other things he said.

I keep on not believing them until suddenly I do.

It is not a yolk I am hauling anymore but a cross, suddenly.  A cross.  His cross.  My cross.  The weight is different.  It is light and yet it is not.  Because it is not my strength that carries it but his, his strength somehow through me.

And this is not a burden meant for a beast.  This is a burden made for a man.  It is the wieght I was born to carry.  It is both easy and not-easy, but I was born to carry it and the strength does not come from me, to carry it:  it simply flows through me.

I reach down and pluck one of the fruits by my knees.  I am surprised at its redness.  I am surprised that it is sweet. 

Yoklohoma where the sun beats down on the plain…

It’s interesting.  I’ve never written much that was directly related to the idea of romantic relationships between Christians and non-Christians.   Nonetheless, this is an area that I have some opinions about, and an area I have some experience in.   There’s probably some connection between the fact that my experiences and opinions appear to be unusual ones.   And it seems like a topic we ought to be talking more about.  I’ve had a few people kind enough to ask me my opinion on this very topic.  (You can find some on this blog.)  These thoughts, then, are a bit of a summary of what I’ve said to the people who’ve asked my thoughts on the whole issue of should we as Christians seek out romantic relationships with people that aren’t Christians.

But before I get to what I think, I’ll do a quick biography.  For a much more detailed bio, click here.

To make a long story short:

I grew up a seeker. 

 I fell in love with a Christian.

Early on in our marriage we both acted like idiots.

She stopped acting like an idiot.

She almost died.

I came to Christ.

(Wow, what a depressing and liberating exercise, to boil down your life into 6 short sentences.  Everybody ought to try that.)

Anyway, that’s where I’m coming from.  In no particular order, here’s a few specifics about what I believe and why I believe it.

#1) God was trying hard to reach me.  I was to pig-headed to respond and so he continually upped the ante.  I don’t know if I would have come to Christ without the woman who is now my wife.  God is almighty and probably would have found a way.  But it’s hard for me to concieve of what this would have been.  Not because God isn’t powerful but because I can be a stubborn bone head.

#2) It wasn’t easy for my wife.  Her walk probably suffered for what she did.

#3) By the world’s standards, according to the criteria I was judging, I just about always won our verbal debates.  I’m good at manipulating arguments and twisting words.  She probably lost more ground than she gained on those rare occasions that she’d debate verbally with me.

#4) We were married about 5 years before I came to Christ.  For about 2-3 of these, she’d made the decision not to follow the foolish, destructive script that I’d gotten used to.  It took me that long (2 1/2 years!!!!) to ”get it” that I was being hurtful and destructive and she wasn’t striking back.  Two and a half years is a very long time to live that way.

#5) A lot of people who should have been supportive to my wife within the Christian community weren’t.

#6) One of the most powerful things she ever said to me, before I was a Christian: “Someday I think you’ll be a great man for God.” I didn’t understand why this effected me when she said it.  Much later I came to understand that among other reasons for rejecting Christianity was the simple fact that I didn’t think I could do it.  Hearing her say that she believed that I could do it and do it well was a huge thing.

Later, I’ll post some wider, more theological and less personal thoughts on this subject. 

Testimony

“For there is one God and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus, who gave himself as a ransom for all men—the testimony given in its proper time.”- 1 Timothy 2:5-6

I began to contemplate and pray over that verse. The thing that jumped out at me was how differently Paul uses the word “testimony” than we do.
Today, we’d use the word “testimony” to describe a series of words, a monologue where we describe what Jesus has done for us. Our reason for offering up a testimony is usually to convert others. Often times we recognize that we need to do more than offer up words, but the thing is this: we still use “testimony” to describe the words we use. We say things like “We need to act Christ-like and then offer our testimony once we’ve built trust.” Testimony and action are seperate things.
The thing I notice is that the ransom is the testimony. This means, at the bare minimum, testimony and action are one and the same. If Jesus ransom of me is part of his testimony, then the things I do (and not just the words I say) are part of mine. On this understanding, the statement above is quite redundant. I wouldn’t act Christ-like first and then offer my testimony. I’d act Christ-like (partially) because it’s part of my testimony.
Perhaps there’s an even wider observation to be made. Sometimes I feel like we obsess on the cross. It’s as if the teachings before, they were a nice little appetizer. And the reseruction after was a tasty desert. But the crucifixion itself: that’s the meat and potatoes, that’s the entree itself.
In short, We identify those few hours as the atonement itself, usually.
But if we take this verse seriously it seems like there is an implication. If the testimony of Jesus is the same thing as his ransom of us, then the atonement took much longer than those few hours that Jesus hung on the cross. It was begun before his birth and it continued after his death. The atonement is ongoing, today, and Jesus teachings, both pre-Easter and post-Easter, these are intregal parts of the atonement itself.
There’s probably all sorts of implications for us in this. If we take this holistic view of what testimony is, then the very act of conversion becomes a wider drama, not a thing we can locate at only one place and time.
Choosing to follow Christ is just as important as the crucifixion itself. But these are both singular actions which exist in a wider drama.

How I came to Christ IV: Your turn

In 3 posts below, I explore my spiritual journey.

What about yours?
Post a comment below. Share where you’re at now, spiritually. Explore how you got there. Whatever faith commitment you’ve made, how has it changed you?
Come on, do it. All the cool kids are doing it.

If you’re interested in my story, check the posts on this blog “How I came to Christ, I” “How I came to Christ II” and “How I came to Christ III”

How I came to Christ III: My life after becoming a Christian

What changed after I accepted Christ?
Nothing.
Everything.
(If you’re interested in what my life was like before I made that decision, or why I did, take a look at my posts: How I came to Christ, parts I and II respectively.)
I still have good days and bad days. In truth, some of the hardest days of my life have come since becoming a Christian.

I know that some people become Christians and all there problems go away. They are happy all the time. All there problems shrink. All the sinful aspects of their lives go away. They are healed instantly, and they are whole.
If you’re looking for these, you’ll have to go looking somewhere else. This wasn’t my experience. I think I’m overall happier, but Jesus is not uber-prozac; people who know me would be the first to tell you I’m not somebody whose always got a smile on his face. (I’m a firm believer in psychiatric medications; no disrespect is meant at the prozac crack.)
So what’s changed? What’s the point? Why bother?

I believe for most people, becoming a Christian is the beginning of a journey toward Truth. I’m open to the possibility that some people are teleported to the truth, Star-Trek style. But for most of us, it glorifies God that we walk… and it is a long walk.
The difference between being embarked on an epic journey and randomly wandering is mostly whether or not you have a destination.
There was a time I wandered through life. Now I am embarked on an epic journey.
This meaning of the whole trip converys meaning to every little step. When I experience the metaphorical equivalent of a strained ankle or a blister, it is a blister I have in the name of my creator and redeemer.
When I’m at my best I feel the troubles of life less sharply and the joys of life more accutely. The idea that I am loved, that I am deeply and truly and loved, changes everything…
when I let it.

When I am praying, when I am serving, when I am in the scripture… not just reading it for geeky show off points, not just reading it to earn brownie points with God, not just reading it to garner support for presuppositions I had before even opening the bible… in short, when I’m reading the bible the right way; when it’s more an act of love and communication than a task a set of propostions…
When all these things happen my every day reality is transformed in profound, inexplicable, and deep ways.
When I don’t engage in these acts of love and communication with my creator, my life is not really much different than it was before Jesus was a part of it.

I don’t really mean that last sentence. Except that I exactly do.

It’s frustrating to try and put words to this. The simple act of orienting my life toward Jesus, of accepting Him into my heart, this is an action which is much greater than everybody ever said… and at the same time, if I don’t follow it up, with actions, if my confession is just for show, it’s exactly, at the same time, much less, too… But when I do follow it up, when my confession is one that penetrates me, when I know that it is heart-felt because it spurs me on to act on it… then everything is so different.

This makes it sound like Christ is only with me sometimes… and this, too, isn’t right. He is with me. But it’s more like, sometimes I’m with him, and other times, when he says “Follow me.” I say, “uhhm, I think I’ll take this short cut over here.”
I say this forgetting that the Israelite’s short cut lead to 40 years in the desert.
Evem when I go my way Jesus rains manna of all sorts on me. He doesn’t leave me even though I leave him… He continues to call after me, and I hear him, and sometimes I turn and follow, and sometimes I don’t… And I guess this is the story of the whole human race, of all human history.

How I came to Christ, Part II: Jesus invades my life

I posted a while ago about my life before I became a Christian. If you’re interested, it’s here:

http://jeffsdeepthoughts.wordpress.com/2008/02/27/how-i-came-to-christ-part-i-my-life-before-jesus-invaded-it/
Today I’m going to write about that night that I became a Christian. It’s a little bit like those rock groups that get labelled “overnight success stories” when in fact they’ve been working below the public’s radar for years: my conversion experience was both quite dramatic and sudden and also a long time in coming.
When I left off in that last post, my wife was in the hospital. She was quite literally fighting for her life. My support network had gradually eroded. People I’d counted on for years were suddently not there. I had two very young kids that I was suddenly soley responsible for.
A sermon came to mind. Lonnie, the pastor, had preached on the story of Gomer. He’d shared the biblical principal that sometimes God ruthlessly cuts away at our support network and all the things we’re leaning on if these things stand in the way of our coming to Him.
In those circumstances, after having really wrestled with some stuff, it was hard not to apply that to myself.

And there was this night. It’s so over-the-top dramatic that I’m embarassed to admit it: There was this tremendous thunderstorm. Flashes of lightning lit up the room. Cracks of thunder rolled through the house.
I sat there, in the living room. It was much more like wrestling with God than praying. It was such a visceral, physical experience… even though I was just sitting there.
I had another thought from the sermons at the church we’d been attending. The series was about the idea that we offer should offer ourselves to God as living sacrifices. A central image to that series was that the challenge of being a living sacrifice is that we have this tendency to keep crawling off the altar.
I’m not usually a visual person, but that night, I could see it so clearly in my mind. In truth it’d probably been modeled more off of cheesy horror films than an actual biblical altar, but I saw it there, in my mind’s eye.
The altar/sacrifice thing, I could get.
The Gomer ruthless thing, I could get.
But the cross… which clearly was at the center of all this… it just didn’t work. I couldn’t make it make sense. I new even more clearly that if I could just find some way to make it make sense, then Jesus would have me: heart and soul. I knew that this was the last obstacle.
But it was quite an obstacle.
What did Adam’s mistake in the garden have to do with me? What did Jesus’ death have to do with my own sin? How was there justice in this? Why did God need to do it? Couldn’t he do everything he wanted? Wasn’t there a less horrible way?

I remembered something that I’d read a long time ago. It was from a book by Madeline L’Engle. L’Engle was one of those authors who created a disconnect between. She was a Christian but she was reasonable, intellectual, and loving. There were a few people like this. Some I knew personally. Others I only knew of through their art. But it seemed like they were on to something, Christianity did something to them, it changed them for the better.

At any rate, Madeline, through her characters, says that God can handle our worries and doubts and fears and anger. We should turn this stuff over to Him, and he will accept it.
So that altar was still there in my mind. And I turned over my rage and fear and sorrow and guilt over to God. It was there, in front of me. It looked like intestines or excrement. Not a very pretty picture.
God took it up though. He took it from me. The first thing I felt was relief, a sense of being healed, a sense of being lightened.
The second thing I felt was disapointment in myself, bordering on shame. God gave me everything. He created the universe. He created sunsets and hot tubs and laughter. And what had I given him in return?
A large pile of excrement.
And he’d taken it.

But I realized something: the best I could do wouldn’t be much better. If I could visualize the best of myself, if I could take it of me and offer it to God, it wouldn’t be a bonus for God, it wouldn’t be extra credit. The very best of me was exactly what I owed God.
I was crystal clear in that moment that I’d fallen short of my potential. Every day of my life I could have done more, I could have done better.
God had given me this shining, holy, potential. I had corrupted it through my own errors (sin) I had fallen short of it through my own laziness, short-sightedness, and selfishness.

The very best I could offer God was just an echo of what God had given me. I could never have a balanced relationship with God.
And these thoughts they didn’t come all at once, but my mind was racing. They came quickly, one after the other. They weren’t exactly in words, but the following is something like a translation into words of what I experienced:
I started thinking about my kids. If they borrowed a dollar from me, I think I’d want them to pay it back. Not because I need a dollar. But because it’s not good to be indebted, to be out of balance. But it would be silly for me to loan him another dollar to pay back the first. If I wanted my son to be in a right relationship with me, I’d have to create a way for this debt to be cancelled that didn’t involve me giving it to him.
It’s that way with God, too. There is a debt in our relationship. Even if I gave him back everything he gave me, this does not cover the debt I owe through falling short.
Suddenly it didn’t matter about Adam. Working out the issue of original sin was irrelevant. In some important way I realized that I am Adam everytime I fall short of God’s dreams for me. I eat of the tree every time I sin.
It occured to me that the way to restore this relationship was a contradiction: Only God has enough “wealth” to pay it back, only He possesses things he wasn’t given… and yet it couldn’t be God, any more than I could loan my son a dollar to pay back the first one.

Both God and not-God. Is there a better definition of Jesus?
And then it fell into place. I invited Jesus inside. The invasion began.
More later.

How I came to Christ, part I: My life before Jesus invaded it.

As we approach Easter, I’ve been mindful of Jesus impact on my life.
Easter has importance for all Christians, or atleast it should; it’s a celebration of Jesus victory over death and the changing of history.
Easter is also the time of the year I came to Christ. It was about one week before. I’m embarassed to say I can’t at this point, calculate whether it was 4 years ago or 5 years ago. (I’m fighting the flu today and a little muddle-headed. Maybe I’ll edit this post later when I figure it out.)
I thought what I’d do was post a series. This first one will describe what my life was like before Jesus. In the next one I’ll describe my conversion. In Part III, I’ll describe what my life has been like since then, how I think Jesus has changed me.
If I was Donald Miller I’d probably find something zany to say here to keep you interested and amused. Unfortunately, I’m no Donald Miller. But the good news is that it’s free to read my blog and you have to pay to read his books. So I guess you get what you pay for.
Anyway, I was not a Christian for most of my life.
This is probably an understatement. I was more-or-less anti-Christian all my life. I found Christianity cloying, superficial, hypocrtical, judgemental. The truth is, I sometimes still do. Sometimes– then and now– my irritation with Christianity is a result of my own sin, unhealthy expectations, and unfair expectations. Sometimes– then and now– my belief that Christianity is cloying, superficial, etc. is a result of the fact that Christianity is all those things.
I was fascinated by the person of Christ though. I was a seeker and found myself briefly flirting with a variety of traditions: Budhism, Unitarian Universalism, Hinduism.
I was raised in a home where I was encouraged to be inquisitive. Church was a thing we went to on occasional holidays to placate grand parents. Mostly it felt irrelevant. Occasionally, during the hymns, I’d get these little flashes of joy and truth. But mostly, it was this place that was embarassing to be. They all seemed to speak the language. They all knew what to expect. I felt like everybody was watching me and knowing I wasn’t one of them.
There were loud mouthed Christians in my life that caused me to doubt the movement that Jesus started. There were amazing, loving Christians that created this disconnect between what I wanted to believe about Jesus and what I actually saw.
I was an am a nature lover. I’d explore truth and Truth; wonder about what it all meant.
I became a philosophy major in college. The school I attended had some pretty heavy hitters. Folks who were also fascinated by the person of Christ. These are people I would have significant doctrinal disputes with today. One of these guys was a major player in the field of Religious Pluralism. Religious Pluralism is the belief that all the major world religions point to the same Ultimate Truth. Another of these guys was the major authorirty on the Gospel of Thomas. This guy flew to Egypt and created translation of this text that you can find at Barnes and Noble.
Many Christians would consider these guys dangerous. I think they are wrong… But I know that they had good hearts and I believe that the Holy Spirit was working through them, at least in as much as nurtured my fascination with this Jesus character.
If I was Brian Mclaren, I’d probably say something deep and provacotive here about how God works in the places we least expect him. But I am no more Brian McLaren than I am Don Miller.
I got a chunk of the way through graduate school. I was working on a Master’s Degree in Philosophy. It’s worth mentioning my life plan at this point. Those who know me generally find it amusing. This is what I’d planned for myself at the age of 22:
*To earn a masters and eventually a doctorate in Philosophy or Philosophy of Religion.
*To spend my life educating inquisitive college students.
* To climb up into an ivory tower, lock myself in, and throw away the key.
* To engage in serial monogamy: I’d given up on the idea that marriage makes any sense.
*To never, never, never have kids.

Contrast this with where my life is now:
*I’m a special education teacher… I did finally end up with My M.Ed.
*I’ve spent the last decade of my life educating behaviorally disorded adolescents.
*I’ve mostly taught in windowless, inner city class rooms. I once taught in a room so cold that we couldn’t use pens because the ink froze.
*I’ve been married to the light of my life for over a decade.
*I have 3 amazing kids.

At any rate, I had this plan.
Then I met my wife, a Christian. We had some challenges. We ended up with a child and not very much in common. We didn’t like each other much, in the early years of our marriage.
We’d debate Christianity. I was always super-proud of myself when I could trounce her faith.

My biggest issue with Christianity was the cross itself. It seemed like divine child abuse. It made so sense. I didn’t see myself in need of salvation.

I began to give on the Religios Pluralism program though. The more I studied, inquired, thought, and struggled the more it became clear to me that we have to do great violence to the world’s religious tradition if we’re going to try and line them all up to be saying the same thing.
I realized that there is some ethical common ground. (Though this sometimes gets over played.) But in order for the metaphysical claims of the great faith traditions to all be equally valid they have to be so utterly watered down that they are hardly worth adhering to.
One of my last requirements for my Master’s degree in philosophy was to pass a foreign language exam. Mounting bills for our newborn and my learning disabality got in the way of this. I ended up teaching in a residential facility. (Mostly because they were desperate not because I had any meaningful qualifications for the job.)
And at some point, my wife, just decided she wasn’t going to continue living the life she had been.
It was annoying at first. She had lines. I had lines. Had she lost her script? Didn’t she get it? On Mondays I was supposed to say foolish, hurtful things. She was supposed to retaliate. On Tuesdays, it was her turn to pick the fight. On Wednesdays, we’d both act stupid simultanously. On Thursdays… Well, you get the picture.
But she just stopped.
I didn’t for a long time.
I probably could have kept going forever if she’d continued to be as much an idiot as I was. But she wasn’t. I eventually got it: she’d made a decision to stop. She couldn’t change my behavior much but she could own responsibility for hers. And she just stopped.

This witnessed more loudly to me than a thousand debates. I don’t generally remember this very well: Serving and suffering are a thousand times the witness as argumentation and debate. But when I’m at my best I really do get it, because I experienced it.

We began going to a church. I mostly liked the music. But the sermons were relevant. I sometimes even found myself nodding my head to them, in agreement. (Whenever this was commented on by my wife I was sure to mantain rigid control over my head next time.) It fed my lifetime fascination with Jesus. (That was fellowship Church; there’s a link for it over to the right.)
I still struggled with the cross but I was able to articulate something I’d never been able to put words to before this: If I could just make Christianity seem plausible, if I could just make sense of things like the cross, it wouldn’t just be one possible explanation; it would be the full truth.

I shared some of my thoughts, fears, and struggles with the pastor and assistant pastor. (Marty also has a link over to the right.) In some sense, I was sort-of daring them, I think. Will you be able to handle this? Will you accept me even though I totally disagree with you?

Marty did more than accept what I had to say. He befriended me. When I’d share an objection to Christianity, sometimes he’d say “Well, some people believe this” other times he’d say “You know, a portion of the bible that seems relavant is…” In some ways, the type of response that impressed me most was when he said “I’ve never really thought of that before. That’s a really good point.”
Marty never made me feel like a product. He never engaged in a chess match. He heard me and agnowlodged that my wrestling match with God was legitimate. This witnessed to me more powerfully than a thousand business cards with bible passages written on them.
This was about the time that my wife almost died and a variety of other supports I’d always counted on completely fell apart. But I’m going to save that for Part II.

Leave some comments…. Are you a Christian? If not, what do you think of Jesus? What do you think of most Christians?
If you are a Christian, what was your life like before Jesus invaded it?

The Valley of Shadows

There are two valleys of the shadowof death.

There is a place where the dusk opresses

like a sopping wool blanket.

It is winter in the desert.

I was there.

And I did not know

if I was thankful that those sheer cliffs

blotted it out, blotted most of it out.

Because If the pall it cast was this,

this terrible wieght,

what of the source of the shadow?

There are two valleys

of the shadow

of death.

They are located in precisely the same place

and yet they are not the same.

I am in the other one, now.

and I rejoice.

You are with me,

You will always be with me.

I see that there is something else that might be meant by

The Valley of the Shadow of Death.

Death has been made small

Death has been brought low

Death has been demoted;

it now bares a lower case “d”…

death is a shadow of what it once was,

and at the other side

of this valley

waits Life Eternal.